


Hold Me Close and Hold Me Fast

by MistahJay (CassLikesFic)



Series: Gotham's Finest [4]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Cisswap, Defining the Relationship, F/M, Femdom, Femme!Joker, Gender or Sex Swap, Genderswap, Masc!HarleyQuinn, Relationship Negotiation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-28
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2021-01-05 22:02:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21215768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CassLikesFic/pseuds/MistahJay
Summary: Joker knows Harley loves her. What she does next with that information is anyone’s guess.





	Hold Me Close and Hold Me Fast

Considering the feds were mostly standing around, smoking and talking shit to one another, it was easy to get to the Wayne by 8:00. After all, who would be crazy enough to cross police tape when on the other side of it was a building supposedly wired to blow by killer clowns?

Quinn shifts his flowers to lift the tape, walks right to the door, and slips inside. No one notices him. Chairs knocked over, purses and jackets forgotten, glasses upturned. The lights still on, faint music playing somewhere. Something with a trumpet, sweet and a little sad. It was gilt and opulence and panic, all at once. In the center of the room sat a pristine table with spotless linen, a small placard bearing the word “Reserved” in looping gold calligraphy. A bottle of champagne chilling in a sweating ice bucket, and two glasses waiting.

“I didn’t think Bruce Wayne would mind if we took his table.” Joker says with an amused, pleased air, somewhere behind him. Quinn waits for her to come to him with a smile, the doubt and uncertainty falling away. He got it right. She's here. There's an unfamiliar sound to her footsteps on the marble floor - a soft, deadly click. Joker steps in front of him and Quinn’s thoughts come to a screeching halt.

“Are those for me? How sweet.” Joker presses a soft kiss to his cheek, leaving a bloody print, and takes the roses. She makes a show of inhaling their fragrance. The dress _(she's_ _wearing a dress, oh God)_ is the color of old blood, still her signature. Made of plush velvet and fitted to her lean, dangerous body in a timeless silhouette. The makeup is the same - there's comfort in that familiarity - but the short waves of her hair are swept back away from her face. The effect is elegant and unsettling.

“You look beautiful.” Quinn says hoarsely as she pulls out a chair for him. He stares at her hands as they push him gently down into the chair. They're the same as always, blunt nails with chipping green paint and calloused fingertips. “What’s the occasion?”

“Do I need one?” Joker trails her fingertips along the freshly shaven skin of his jaw. Even cut so short, with enough pressure they can feel sharp.

“No.” The corner of her brightly painted mouth quirks up slightly. Quinn realizes it's the first time she’s heard him say it. “You don’t need one.” He amends softly, gazing up at her.

“You  _ can _ tell me no.” Joker replies, ignoring the rest of his response.

“No.” Quinn says again, softly, testing the weight of it on his tongue. It feels strange. Joker settles into the chair across from him with a self-satisfied air. She pours them both champagne, although Quinn doesn't need it, his head's already spinning.

“Are you happy, Harley?”

“...do you want me to be?”

“Hmm.” Joker taps her nails against the side of her wine glass. It chimes softly in response. Quinn empathizes. “I want you to be honest.”

“When I’m with you, I’m happy.”  


“And when you’re not with me?”

Quinn thinks about filling the emptiness of his apartment with thoughts of her. Thinks about sleepwalking through days on the force, trying to keep the peace in a city that's anything but peaceful. He thinks about the different ways he tortures himself, when she isn’t there to do it for him. Thinks about the impulse that sent him to an abandoned comedy club with a proposal that very well could have gotten him killed, months ago.

“When I’m not with you, I think I’m going crazy.”

“We’re all crazy.” Joker says with a surprising amount of sympathy, reaching out to cover his hand with hers. Quinn knows better than to turn his hand to take it. He's well trained. He presses his palm flat to the tablecloth and swallows the desire to run his thumb slowly along the bones in her wrist. “Do you love me, Harley?” The question hits him like an unexpected slap. He reacts the same way, with a sharp inhale, a shudder, and a hot stab of arousal.  


“Yes.” He breathes, soft as a prayer.

“Would you do anything for me?” The pause stretches too long as he considers his answer.

“...no.” The list is very short, but there are still lines he won't cross. Not even for her.

“What won't you do for me?” Joker seems fascinated by this new element. Knowing he could refuse, although he almost never does.

“I won’t kill for you. Hurt innocent people. I won’t steal.”  


“Harley.” Her voice is warm, amused, pleased, chiding. “I have clowns for that. You’re different.” The look of painful relief washing over his features makes her laugh brightly. “Would you hurt  _ me _ ?”

“Never.” Another new word, and her smile widens, almost gloating now.

"What if I  _ wanted _ you to? Asked you to pin me down, have me the way you thought you would that first time, leave marks? Bruise me a little." Her voice is teasing, playful, a little conspiratorial. "Just a little bruise, where no one would see it. You've thought about leaving a  _ little _ bruise."

"That's not how I think about touching you." Quinn feels the sharp metallic snap of a trap closing around him. Caught. His eyes widen slightly and he shakes his head in frantic denial. "No- I mean-" Joker leans forward and slips a single fingertip under his chin, lifting it with the slightest pressure. Quinn, forced to meet her eyes, does, but it's the most difficult thing he's ever done. The second she takes her hand away he ducks his head deferentially, but he keeps his eyes on hers.

"Tell me."

“I can’t-”

“You will.” She takes a small sip of her champagne, watching him like prey. “You will because I want to know. And you want to make me happy.”

Quinn releases his death grip on the arms of his chair, flexing aching hands and looking at her helplessly. “I don’t know where to start.”

"Close your eyes.” She says softly, reaching across the table to lightly brush her fingertips over his eyelids. Like smoothing down the gaze of an unseeing corpse. It’s so, so comforting to have the darkness. “When I’m not in front of you, where do you go?”

“Back to you.” He says softly.

“Always back to me?” Her thumb brushes the corner of his mouth.

“Always. You’ve given me lots of good memories. I go back to them.”  _ I will, Harley. I will make you pay for it. My way. _

“Which one is your favorite?”

“The first time. I think about the first time a lot.” His mouth is dry, and he wets his lips with his tongue.

“We’ve had better times.”  


“Yeah, but I didn’t know your rules the first time. It was… Different.” His own voice reminds him of that first meeting. It holds the sound of someone who’d take a beating to feel something new. It sounds like a challenge.  _ Can you think of a way to hurt me I haven't come up with yet?  _ “You taught me what you wanted.”

“What do you think I wanted, Harley?”

“I still don’t know. But you taught me how to give it to you.”

“How do you give me what I want?”

“I say yes when I mean it. I don’t lie. I take what you give me, I...say thank you when you make me grateful. I-I try to be good for you. I apologize when I’m not.” His brow furrows in concentration, reading off the list of unwritten rules. It feels like blasphemy, saying it out loud. It feels like a confession. “I don’t assume you want things.” He opens his eyes reluctantly, resisting her command, heavy lidded, languid. “But you want something. You must. Why would you keep doing this?”

“Because you let me.” Joker answers, equally softly. He stiffens in surprise at her foot nudging his knees apart, the sole pressed firmly against his crotch. "Because I like how much you enjoy letting me. You get my jokes, Harley."

"You haven't told me any."

"I've heard you laugh with me." Harley squirms with the hot flush of embarrassment that spreads through him, remembering all of the times she's broken him down, helpless and laughing. Her foot presses down more firmly, the sharp point of the heel bruising his inner thigh. "I like making you laugh."

"You make me cry, too."  _ Please, please, chanted in the bright lights of that dressing room. Let me, and don't stop, and there, and please, please, please... _

"I like doing a lot of things to you." It's her turn to pause thoughtfully, and Quinn feels back on solid ground while he waits for her to decide what that means tonight. It probably means another long, aching walk home, but being tormented and sent away is its own kind of love song. He doesn't mind. "I want to see you naked, Harley." The pressure on his groin lifts, and she kicks the chair leg beneath him in a sharp gesture. Quinn manages to catch himself on the table edge, glass and silverware rattling. The sudden action startles him into movement and he's on his feet before his brain registers his body's reflex.  


"What about dinner?" He chokes out, hands tight on the tablecloth. She's never shown interest in removing any of his clothing but what she absolutely had to in order to have him the way she wanted. He's worried about disappointing her.

"Apparently the kitchen staff all left when  _ someone _ threatened to blow the restaurant up. Terrible service. Now stop stalling and strip."Joker snaps her fingers at him. Reaches across the table and takes Quinn's untouched glass, raising it in a mocking toast. "And fold your clothes. This is a nice restaurant; don't make a mess." She takes a dainty sip of the champagne, her eyes flinty.

This is the first time he's felt close to truly afraid in the months they've spent together, doing…Whatever this is. Quinn's hands shake as he struggles with the buttons on his jacket. He shrugs out of it, folds it neatly and leaves it on the chair, swallows around his pulse. "What if you don't like what you see?"

"I will." Joker smiles at him slowly over the rim of her glass. "You're pretty when you're nervous, but you're prettier when you beg. The sooner I see you, the sooner I can decide what I'm going to do with you."

_ With _ is an unfamiliar word, and Quinn feels jumpy in his own skin, like a skittish horse. He could bolt, he supposes, but is there anything outside this room that could match this exquisite terror? Of course not. And he loves her.

By the time he's naked and barefoot, he can't stop trembling, and his cock is so hard it's pressed tight to his stomach, pearling at the tip. He's breathing raggedly and startles when Joker stands, circling him slowly.

"I feel like I  _ should _ tease you about how difficult that was, but I don't think it would be funny." She murmurs, trailing her nails over the freckled skin of his shoulders. "I've done worse to you."

"Not like this." Quinn says hoarsely, letting his hair fall over his eyes.

"No, not like this." She whispers. Her eyes travel over him, lingering on scars and lean, ropy muscles. He feels like she's drinking in every detail, weighing, measuring, labelling. Her fingertips rest on an old scar on his upper arm - a bullet graze. "You haven't been careful, Harley." She says quietly. There's feeling behind it.

"It's part of the job." He supplies. He isn't laughing. He isn't crying. He isn't begging. This is something new, it's not part of their game, and he's silent with the weight of it. The potential of it stretches tight between both of them.

"I could make sure no one ever hurts you but me." It has the strength of a threat and the tenderness of a proposal. Her hands comb through his hair, tightening just enough to make him gasp and steady him. "I could  _ keep _ you."

"Do you want to?"

"You're going to kiss me." She says, her voice deadly and sharp. "And if I like it, maybe I'll tell you." He wishes she'd said yes, so desperately that something cracks open inside him.

How do you kiss someone you're not allowed to touch? How do you navigate the transition from  _ being done to _ into  _ doing with _ ? The way they tell you to.

Harley slides a hand into the Joker's hair, returning all of the cruelty and tenderness she's ever shown him. He tightens his fingers just a little in those green curls, and licks into her mouth. He kisses her wetly and hungrily, the way he dreams of when he falls asleep after she sends him home. He kisses her like he'd consider hurting her, just a little, if she ordered him to. He kisses her like they're equals. He kisses her like she loves him back. He pulls away, breathless. Before she can say anything else, he begs her with his whole heart.

"Keep me."  
  
  
  



End file.
